Chimera of Batius - Chapter 32
Memories with Batius
“Cheil.”
A small bear, clinging to the bars of its cage, looked at the young Cheil. Without a word, Cheil scanned the interior of the underground laboratory. The crematorium, where failed specimens were burned, still radiated heat. It meant another flawed creation had recently been incinerated.
It was the inevitable fate of the weak. As failures—weak and imperfect—they deserved such an end.
“Ah, it hurts. Ah, it hurts.”
The bear continued to call to Cheil. It was the only test subject there capable of human speech.
“What?”
“Ah, it hurts. Cheil. Ah, it hurts.”
The bear pointed with its small paw, then patted its own furry cheek. Finally, Cheil understood what the bear was trying to communicate.
“…My cheek?”
“Cheil.”
The bear nodded.
The day before, he had picked wildflowers for Batius, only to be slapped. Batius had flown into a rage, complaining that the thorns had scratched his skin. Then, he had seized Cheil, his eyes alight with a cruel idea.
“Heal it. You can do it.”
Cheil looked at the cuts from the thorns and branches. Nothing happened. When he looked back at Batius with a confused expression, the man’s fury erupted.
“Why! Why can’t you do it yet? You are clearly a successful specimen!”
The flowers he had so carefully gathered were crushed under Batius’s heel, obliterated. Flowers were weak, too. Flowers were trash. If he wasn’t strong… if he was weak, this would be his fate. If he couldn’t prove he was a superior being…
He remembered the test subjects that had been dismembered and fed into the furnace.
If I am not strong, I will end up like them.
Summoning all his will, he stared at his palm. To survive, to be deemed worthy, he commanded every cell in his body to regenerate. To his own surprise, the wounds began to close.
“Batius.”
As he extended his healed palm, Batius looked at him with devilish intensity. Seeing the vanished scars, he burst into triumphant laughter.
“You are my masterpiece after all! Cheil, you are my perfect creation!”
Batius was exultant. Yet, he showed no concern for the swelling his own hand had left on Cheil’s cheek.
“Cheil.”
Cheil himself had almost forgotten the swelling. He was largely insensitive to such minor pains. Besides, in the isolated forest house where only Batius and the test subjects lived, no one else would have noticed or cared about Cheil’s cheek.
“Does it hurt?”
No one, that is, except for this small, weak test subject—the bear.
He approached the cage. A soft, furry paw reached out and gently caressed his cheek. The warmth he felt was strange, unfamiliar. He had no words for the sensation.
“Does it hurt?”
But one thing was certain: the pain was gone.
“No. It doesn’t hurt anymore.”
When he answered, the bear withdrew its paw. It was a single moment of connection, a flicker of compassion in the oppressive darkness of the underground.
That was the last memory he had of the small bear.
Because shortly after, Batius’s house caught fire. Unfortunately, it happened while Batius was away in town, searching for new materials for his experiments. When Cheil awoke to the smell of smoke, he immediately rushed down to the basement. It was a scene from hell. The agonized howls of test subjects and animals echoed through the space. The underground laboratory had become a crematorium. In that moment, Cheil remembered the little bear’s paw—the one that had gently caressed his cheek. He could not bear the thought of that paw turning to black ash.
His first act was to open the bear’s cage. Using all his strength, he tore the bars away and opened every door he could reach. Some test subjects fled into the forest; others perished in the flames. Cheil grabbed the little bear’s paw and escaped. But he had nowhere to go. Looking down at the small hand in his, he remembered the slap he had received not long before.
He had saved another weak creature. If Batius discovered he had freed the bear… he would face another beating and harsh punishment. And the bear… this fragile being would be dismembered and tossed into the furnace. He did not want that. He did not want that paw to turn to ash.
After a moment of hesitation, Cheil pushed the bear away.
“Go north.”
Batius hates the cold.
“Go to the northernmost part of this land and hide where it is frozen. That way, Batius will never find you.”
That way, I won’t be punished. And your paw won’t turn to ash.
“Cheil. Together.”
“I will not go with you.”
You are weak, but I am strong. If no one finds out I freed you… I can stay with Batius as if nothing happened.
“Go. Remember. You must go to the far north, where it is bitterly cold.”
He gave the bear a final push, careful to avoid its singed fur. In the distance, he could hear voices. Someone was approaching.
“Cheil. Together.”
“Shh, shh! Be quiet…!”
Clop!
A carriage came to a halt at the crossroads where an old inn stood. Jolted by the vibration, Cheil stood up and jumped. The canvas-covered roof of the carriage swayed from the sudden movement. Turning his head, he saw Eden sitting beside him, arms crossed, staring intently.
***
“Damn it… where are we?”
“Where do you think we are? On the road to Rivatron!”
“Why am I here…?”
Cheil remembered what had happened at the forest’s edge.
The soldiers who had come from the north to capture Ruzerolt were Dexler’s personal guards. That meant Dexler never had any intention of letting Ruzerolt live. In other words, his promise to hand Ruzerolt over had been a lie from the start.
To reclaim Ruzerolt, his only option had been to eliminate them all. He intended to slaughter the guards as punishment for their master’s deceit and then pursue Ruzerolt.
The reason he was here, in this carriage, was singular.
Cheil seized Eden by the collar and shoved him against the carriage wall.
“Who told you to interfere?”
Eden, whom he had assumed had fled to the inn, had followed him. Cheil had been standing amidst the carnage, covered in bl00d and trampling the soldiers’ corpses, when Eden shot him with a tranquilizer dart.
Eden grabbed Cheil’s wrist, his expression offended.
“Buddy, if they had captured you back there, do you think it would have stopped with just you? The entire company would have been implicated! It’s a good thing I followed you!”
“If it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have lost Ruzerolt!”
“Are you insane? How can you be so reckless? After everything that’s happened, why are you still obsessed with taking that man?”
Why?
Because he said he needed only me. Because he promised he would stay with me. And also…
“Because I still have no intention of letting him go.”
“You’re mad… You’ve completely lost your mind…”
Eden stared at him in horror.
Cheil jumped down from the carriage. The company members were packing their belongings, preparing to enter the inn. The dark sky held neither moon nor stars. Cheil took a deep breath, his golden eyes gleaming in the obscurity. He could no longer catch the familiar scent of the forest.
“Ruzerolt…”
The veins on his clenched fists bulged.